Review: Rogers One Number

First off, thanks to the folks at Rogers who hooked me up with a Rogers line and phone so I could test out the new service now available to all of their customers for free: Rogers One Number (RON).

Rogers One Number is, in Rogers’ own words, ‘is a new service exclusively from Rogers [which] lets you talk, text and send picture messages, and video chat with other Rogers One Number users, all from your computer using your existing phone number.’ The RON dialog on your computer also allows you to add email inboxes so you can manage as many different methods of communication from one spot as possible.

Before I get into my experiences I want to let you know my quick and dirty opinion on RON and if it is right for you. If you’re a Rogers customer sign up immediately. There is absolutely no reason not to, it’s free and it is a great tool to have at your disposal.

The whole thing was extremely easy to set up from the RON website but note that the setup has to be done from your desktop/laptop and cannot be done from your phone. Once my laptop* had it installed I went to the Android phone I was using to download the contact syncing app. One thing of note when I went to download and install the Android app: you cannot download the app via WiFi due to authentication requirements on the Rogers side.

* I’m running Windows 7 Home Premium on my laptop but the program also runs on Macs. The images I use in this post I got a friend of mine to send me and he uses a Mac. For full compatibility details for PC/Mac check out this page .

Once everything was installed and synced the whole thing was a breeze to use and an absolute pleasure to have at my disposal. The best thing I can liken it to is Google Voice which I use in the USA with my computer and US cell phone. It is great to have – especially in a condo I frequent in South Florida where my US provider doesn’t have reception. A friend of mine who was a beta tester for RON had a similar experience with RON as he doesn’t get reception in his basement and loves the fact that he can now make and receive calls/texts from his computer.

As well, having my number from the cell phone linked to my computer meant I no longer had to worry about charging my phone in one room (or on one side of a room) and being too far away when it rang as long as I was using my computer. (Yes, this is very much one of those #FirstWorldProblems.) Interestingly enough, I noticed that the calls seemed to come in to my PC before they reached the phone by a full second if not longer (I didn’t time it).

One minor user experience annoyance I noticed when using the service was that every time I would click the close button on the browser page RON opened up it would immediately pop up a notification in the corner of my screen informing me that RON was still running in the background. That was great to know the first time I used RON and I closed the window but there did not seem to be any way to tell RON that I never wanted to see this notification again. Like I said, this is a minor annoyance and something which obviously can be changed in a future update. It doesn’t affect the overall functionality of RON, of course and is merely a user interface issue.

RON allows you to set “Reach Me Rules” from your computer as well. This means you can choose when calls will come through and to which lines. As you can see above, you can set a Do Not Disturb up which does exactly what it sounds like. Also, RON give you the power to block some numbers from being able to call you.

The RON service is also extremely useful for all you international travelers. The reason I say this is because as long as you’re travelling with your laptop you don’t have to worry about roaming chargers for making calls and sending texts to Canadian numbers and receiving calls and texts from anywhere as long as you’re on your laptop (or whatever computer you’re using when you’re away) using RON and your phone is turned off (so those incoming texts aren’t being charged to you!).

One thing I should mention is the FAQ/Help page for Rogers One Number. There is a lot of information there that can help people who have questions about the service and I just didn’t see it linked via the RogersOneNumber home page. I don’t know why this is and I assume that it is linked from other places on the main Rogers site which I just didn’t see. Either way, if you were having trouble finding it here’s a link to it: http://www.rogersonenumber.ca/help/. Once there you will see a three “Featured Articles” listed: “Personalize your Rogers One Number site“, “Talk and Text“, and “One Inbox – Manage and Control All Your Communications“. Below that there are a bunch more resources titled “Learn about Rogers One Number” with the main title headings:

Rogers One Number Billing

Using Your Web Phone

Making Calls

My Communications

Managing Your Contacts

Using My Settings

Reach Me Rules

Rogers One Number and Your Device

System and Broadband Requirements

Troubleshooting and Support

Each of those headings above have a couple articles in them as well.

Finally, the page also includes 8 ‘How To’ videos along with an overview video for RON.

In Conclusion:

As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, if you are a Rogers customer I HIGHLY recommend signing up for this service. There is no downside as far as I can tell. It will also come in handy for backing up your device’s contacts to your computer and making the switch to a new platform* easy as pie – something your “IT Guy” will certainly appreciate!

* Examples of “switching to a new platform” switching from an Android to BlackBerry or iPhone to Android. Obviously this RON feature is only usable on platforms that support the RON Contacts app.

Thanks for this post! I’ve been looking to hear about real people experiences of RON.

When you said that the app cannot be downloaded via wifi, do you mean that the app can only be downloaded via data plan?

Is it absolutely necessary to have the contact syncing app downloaded in order for the RON process to work? Does it run in the background of your cellphone all the time (and how is the battery life affected?)

My pleasure, glad to hear you appreciate it Veronica. I will answer your questions to the best of my memory in sequence. As well, since seeing your comment I found a great resource for Rogers One Number Help articles on the RON site which I have linked in my post with a direct link addressing one of your questions specifically below. Finally, I don’t know what device you are using which is likely somewhat relevant in answering the questions but I have answered based on my experience with the Android OS running HTC EVO 3D which Rogers lent me to test RON.

That is what I mean when I said it couldn’t be downloaded via WiFi, yes. However, if I recall correctly Google Play formerly known as the Android Market will allow you to download to your PC/Mac and then send it to your device if it is connected (via USB) to your computer. I believe doing that would mean you’d be using your PC/Mac’s internet connection and then you could avoid incurring data charges if that is your worry. I know that similarly can also be done in BlackBerry App World but do not know if iTunes/iPhone will allow you to do this.

I assume it acts differently on different devices/platforms but no, it didn’t run as an open app in the background all the time on the Android device (the HTC EVO 3D) Rogers lent me to test out RON. I assume it must have been running in some way though because otherwise how could it auto-sync? When you download the app you will see it gives you some Settings to play with. If memory serves there was an option in there for how often/what kind of connection the app should use to sync the contacts.

I did not notice the battery life to be affected in terms of the phone being able to survive as long as my phones typically survive. To be clear, for me it is a rare day when any phone I have used and do use lasts me all day from when I wake up to when I go to bed without charging midway. Usually I need to charge my phone up again in the evening/supper time if I don’t plug in during the day and cannot remember the last time I had a phone when this wasn’t the case. As well, because Rogers lent me this phone and I immediately installed RON on it I cannot speak to how the battery life would have performed without the RON contact syncing app but I assume that RON did not affect battery life in any serious way.

I’ll just confirm that you don’t need a data plan, however data cannot be blocked as the device would need to connect to the wireless network to confirm eligibility (if iPhone it can be downloaded through the app store however wifi would need to be off for it to function).

The app is required to sync contacts. The reach me rules and other admin settings are available through the link provided when registering.

It would not be running in the background, you need to initiate the app to launch it. It can save the login information, however since it is not running in the background it shouldn’t impact battery life.

Might I suggest one thing in relation to Rogers One Number? As I mentioned in my blog post, I only randomly came upon that whole directory of Rogers One Number help files. In my humble opinion it should be clearly linked from the home page rogersonenumber.ca/.

I just tried RON with the hope of giving up my landline. I knew it was going to take some convincing to get my wife to agree so I took it one step at a time installing it on my Mac first and testing it. First complaint: several people commented how bad the sound was when I was conversing on the Mac which has a good mic.
Next I installed the software for my wife and here’s where RON really fell apart. Because we are on the same IP address, each time we logged on, we bumped the other off!
there went any chance of convincing my wife. Rogers admitted this was an issue when I called but this should be a clear bold warming in their info pages- maybe it is.
Finally, the contact sync has left we with three times the number of contacts because every contact is now repeated three or four times. Overall a disappointing experience

Rogers one is a good idea…but its just that. Constantly have to keep logging in dropped calls and text messages. It does not communicate with your phone with logs or messages also the log option doesn’t work on rogers one at all. Answering a call is shotty at best have fun trying to log in when theres an incoming call…and just to tease you shows the number calling in the top corner of the screen…by time you sign in you have missed the caller then check the logs and 0 logs whatsoever. Ive been using it for a week or tying to use it and have had several conversations with phone call but has no logs.

When I say constantly logging in I mean on your phone and computer at the same time or one after the other. solution: get a cordless home phone or a 10 foot curly cord for your regular phone….its back to the 80s my friend.

My internet/wifi connection is good on my computer and phone.

Rogers one is a piece of garbage unless of course they actually fix it but they wont cause its free.